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December 20, 2023

Chicago

The Chicago metropolitan area is home to 51,317 Koreans, the majority of whom (70%) reside in Cook County and the city of Chicago itself. Albany Park, North Park, and West Ridge are the neighborhoods with the highest concentration of Korean residents.

Demographic Data

In Chicago, the Korean senior population grew by 10.6% between 2011 and 2016. However, this growth rate slowed down considerably to 1.5% between 2016 and 2021.

Survey Findings

In Chicago, a total of 100 participants took part in the survey. Among them, 51% fell into the age group of 50-64, while 26% were aged 65-74, 18% were 75-84, and 5% were 85 years or older. The gender distribution was evenly split between female and male participants. Regarding employment status, only 10% of those aged 65 and older were still working, while the majority, comprising 76%, were retired. About half of the participants (52%) relied on Medicare or Medicaid while 39% had private insurance, 5% were uninsured, and 4% had both public and private insurance. Additionally, 28% of the participants did not have a college education, and 16% lacked access to the internet.

Technical Notes

This analysis utilizes data from the 2016 and 2021 American Community Survey 5-year Public Use Microdata Samples, focusing on the “alone” Census category for the Korean population. This means that the term “Korean alone” refers to individuals who identified exclusively as Korean without reporting affiliation with any other ethnic category. Respondents who identified as Korean in addition to another racial group (for instance, Korean and Black) are not included in the “Korean alone” count. In any analysis leveraging Census Bureau data, the “alone” figure should be regarded as the minimum size of the population under consideration.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Demographic Data
Survey Findings
Technical Notes
Acknowledgements

Acknowledgements

This report was co-authored by Linying He, Associate Director of Research, and Research Associates, Dena Li and Yuncheng Wang. Special thanks to Meera Venugopal, Director of Communications, Jenny Shin, Senior Communications Coordinator, and Annie Yang, Social Media Coordinator, for their design and editorial input. Illustrations were designed by Michelle Kwon, freelance illustrator and animator. Rushil Shakya, freelance web consultant, contributed to web development.

AAF is grateful the following member organizations for their contributions to this report: Korean Community Services of Metropolitan New York (KCS – New York, NY), Asian Women’s Christian Association (AWCA – New Jersey), Korean Resource Center (KRC – Los Angeles, CA), Korean Community Service Center of Greater Washington (KCSC – Washington, D.C.), HANA Center (Chicago, IL), Woori Juntos (Houston, TX), and Korean American Community Services (San Francisco).

This report was made possible by the generous support of the Korean American Community Foundation, Korean American Community Foundation of San Francisco, Judith Ehm Foundation and Southpole Foundation.